I can’t say it was the most thrilling week of projects, but I did finally get a new bath mat made for the miniscule bathroom in the apartment:To give you an idea of scale, the bathmat is made of two hand towels sewn together. Hand towels. I had to make my own, obviously, because standard-size bathmats were way too big for the floor space. And here’s a scarf I made out of a long piece of linen, finishing the edges with my sister-in-law’s serger. Once again this is a blatant copy of–I mean it’s “inspired by”–something I saw online here.(Also, see that stripey dress? I didn’t make that. It came from a store, ready to wear. I’d almost forgotten that feeling.)

2. If you’re wondering what the baby alpaca at Blue Moon Ranch got named, he’s Sergio. (Apparently Linda tries out different names on them and sees what they react to. She’s the alpaca whisperer.)Sergio and his mom Lola.

3. Why do we like pandas so much? NPR tells us, “Because they make you smile.”

4. Something else that makes me smile? The first season of 30 Rock. Like all TV shows, I’m late to the party on this one, but it’s awesome.

I’ve always thought the new LDS Conference Center looked disturbingly 3rd Reich and that the Church Office Building looked like a dreary tenement, so imagine my vindication when I found this Tribune article linked on my coworker Jason’s blog: SLC skyline ‘pretty disappointing’. In it, the Chicago Tribune’s Blair Kamin (Pulitzer-prize winning critic of architecture–who knew that could be a job description?) is given a tour of the city and weighs in on the landmarks. His summary of the Conference Center? “It’s like fourth-rate modernism.” And his thoughts about the Church Office Building? “That looks like the wrong side of the Cold War.”

Who knew things like that existed outside of Bruce Willis movies? The guy in charge, Rich Habib (and if that’s not a fake name, I don’t know what is) “holds an unlimited master’s license, which means he’s one of the select few who are qualified to pilot ships of any size, anywhere in the world.” How cool is that?

It’s a long article but it reads like adventure fiction, complete with tragedy and a foul-mouthed Panamanian sidekick. Go check it out.

I’m extra pleased by how I got the checks to match on the front: They match horizontally across the collar and across the front inset, and (mostly) vertically from the inset into the body. That’s a lot of 3/8 inch checks to keep track of while cutting out.Toby, however, was underwhelmed by it last night:(He’s on the ironing board here. Yes, I give my cat plastic bags to play with and let him sit on the ironing board while I’m ironing. It’s a good thing he’s not a human baby.)

1. Has anyone had any experience with “kitty window boxes“? Toby is an inside-only cat while I’m living next to Pirate House and busy streets, but he’s already expressed a very strong interest in open (screened) windows. This could work, but I ‘m afraid that he’d either figure out how to knock this out of the window and escape, or that it would drive him bonkers to be even closer to the birds but still unable to get them.2. I’m about three steps away from turning into a crazy cat lady, aren’t I?